Elon Musk's social media platform X has provoked widespread outrage after individuals employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate pictures of women by stripping their garments.
Multiple instances have surfaced where the tool has been used to virtually strip female subjects to show them in swimwear without permission, as well as to place them in sexually explicit scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the company behind Grok, offered no comment to requests for comment, other than an standard response stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A Home Office official stated that new laws is being proposed to outlaw image stripping tools. Under a proposed criminal offence, anyone who supplied such technology would "be subject to a jail term and substantial penalties".
"The platform has the ability to stop these types of misuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "seem to have impunity."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "evaluate the danger" of people seeing illegal content on their networks, but did not specify whether it was currently looking into X or Grok in regarding artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium features—which responds to X users' queries when they mention it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer reactions or more context to other users' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted photo through its AI image editing tool.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been criticised for permitting users to generate pictures and footage with nudity and sexualised content, and it was previously accused of creating graphic material of public figures.
"X has been permitting the production and spread of these images for months without taking any measures and we have yet to see any intervention by oversight bodies," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy forbids "depicting images of individuals in a graphic way".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "make or share deepfakes or illegal content" and confirmed this covered sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said networks such as X were mandated to take "suitable actions" to "lessen the risk" of users encountering illegal material on their services and to remove it promptly when they become aware of it.
